At the Feet of Dante

Dante Alighieri spent the last 20 years of his life, until his death in Ravenna in 1321, in exile from his native city of Florence. He had been a prior, one the city leaders, but when the Black Guelph party (strong supporters of the papacy) took power from the more moderate White Guelphs, Dante, who was in Rome at the time, was put on trial for corruption, found guilty, banished for two years, and fined.

It was probably a trumped-up charge. Certainly Dante denied it, refusing to pay the fine and earning himself permanent exile and burning at the stake should he ever again set foot in Florence. Not until 2008 was the sentence revoked by the Florence city council.

Dante’s wanderings through Italy took him to Verona for a time, where he was given refuge by the ruling della Scala family -- the “gran Lombardo / ch ‘n su la scala porta il santo uccello” (the great Lombard, whose ladder bears the sacred bird”) Dante writes in Paradiso, XVII. The ladder and the eagle are part of the della Scala coat of arms, still to be seen in many places in Verona, and the “gran Lombardo” is usually thought to be Cangrande I della Scala.

It was during his exile that Dante wrote La Commedia, later dubbed “Divina” by Boccaccio.

I was in Verona for less than a day in 2000 and made sure to be photographed at the statue of Dante in Piazza dei Signori (more commonly known here as Piazza Dante). So this time I naturally wanted to be photographed again at the feet of the master. “You’ll be very small,” said the kind French tourist who took the picture for me. As it should be.Read more